Health
Matters
Tips
offered for summer food safety,
by George Sedlacek
Heroes for the uninsured named,
by Nancy Mathews
Tips offered
for summer food safety
With summertime quickly approaching and backyard
barbeques and family picnics on the horizon, the
Marquette County Health Department reminds the public
about proper food handling and that food safety
is not an option, but an obligation. Consumers need
to know simple steps they can take to prevent foodborne
illness.
“As the temperature rises, so does the risk
of foodborne illness. Hot, humid weather creates
the perfect conditions for the rapid growth of bacteria,”
said Fred Benzie, director of environmental health.
“Summer also means more people are cooking
outside at picnics, barbeques and camping trips,
without easy access to refrigeration and washing
facilities to keep food safe.”
Benzie said foodborne illnesses not only make people
very ill, but have significant costs to the economy.
The USDA has estimated that medical costs and losses
in productivity due to five bacterial foodborne
illnesses (such as E.coli, salmonella and campylobacter)
is nearly $7 billion a year.
To minimize the risks of foodborne illness, follow
these four easy steps when handling and preparing
food:
• Step One: Clean—Wash hands and
surfaces often to avoid the spread of bacteria—Wash
your hands with hot, soapy water for at least twenty
seconds before handling food, and after handling
raw meats or poultry, using the bathroom, touching
pets or changing diapers. Always wash raw fruits
and vegetables in clean water, as you cannot tell
whether foods carry surface bacteria by the way
they look, smell or taste.
• Step Two: Separate—Keep raw meats
and poultry separate from cooked foods to avoid
cross-contamination—When you pack a cooler
for an outing, wrap uncooked meats and poultry securely
and put them on the bottom to prevent raw juices
from dripping onto other foods. Wash all plates,
utensils and cutting boards that touched or held
raw meat or poultry before using them for cooked
foods.
• Step Three: Cook—Make sure you
kill harmful bacteria by properly cooking food—Traditional
visual cues like color are not a guarantee that
food is safe. Don’t guess. Take a digital instant-read
food thermometer along to check when meat and poultry
are safe to eat. Cooked foods are safe to eat when
internal temperatures are 71 degrees C (160 degrees
F) for ground meat; 74 degrees C (165 degrees F)
for leftover food and boned and deboned poultry
parts; and 85 degrees C (185 degrees F) for whole
poultry
• Step Four: Chill—Keep cold food
cold—Perishable foods that normally are in
the refrigerator, such as luncheon meats, cooked
meat, chicken and potato or pasta salads, must be
kept in an insulated cooler with freezer packs or
blocks of ice to keep the temperature at or near
4 degrees C (40 degrees F). Put leftovers back in
the cooler as soon as you are finished eating. The
simple rule is: When in doubt, throw it out.
Groups and organizations planning public food events
must get a temporary food license from the health
department. Benzie said while all area restaurants
are inspected every year for safe food preparation,
without special precautions community events can
turn summer fun into a severe food disease outbreak.
Every licensed event is visited by an environmental
sanitarian who provides education and tips on how
to keep events safe from food-borne illnesses.
For details, call 475-4195 or visit www.mqthealth.org
—George Sedlacek
Heroes for
the uninsured named
Six exemplary health care providers from across
Upper Michigan will be honored May 1 for their contributions
in providing services to uninsured Upper Peninsula
residents.
They will receive 2008 “Hero for the Uninsured”
awards at an evening recognition dinner at Upfront
& Company in Marquette, sponsored by the Upper
Peninsula Health Access Coalition (UPHAC) in observance
of “Cover the Uninsured” Week (April 27
through May 3).
“UPHAC is pleased to again recognize special
people and organizations in 2008 for extending exceptional
assistance to uninsured residents of their communities,”
said Bill Reid, UPHAC board president. “These
‘Hero for the Uninsured’ awardees represent
hundreds of others who partner with the Local Access
Coalitions of the U.P. to selflessly respond to
needs of their families, friends and neighbors without
health care coverage.”
This year’s “Hero for the Uninsured”
awardees are as follows.
• Care Free Dental Clinic, Inc. of Escanaba,
an all-volunteer dental care service for uninsured
Delta County residents, has served more than 255
patients since its inception in January 2008. Fifteen
volunteer dentists and their assistants take turns
seeing patients with the greatest need during two
weekly clinics. Medical Access Coalition (MAC) of
Delta and Menominee counties serves as a call and
referral center for the clinic. The clinic is honored
as an “Innovation Hero.”
• Teresa Kowalski of Dafter is a certified
nurse practitioner who has volunteered at the Community
Health Access Coalition’s (CHAC) monthly clinics
for uninsured Chippewa County residents and has
provided after-hours patient care and consistent
special needs follow-up for uninsured patients with
chronic conditions since her arrival in the area
in July 2006. Her clinic participation for the second
half of 2006 covered sixty-five percent of total
CHAC clinic appointments and fifty-two percent of
appointments for a total of $12,928 in donated services
during 2007. She is being recognized as a “Personal
Touch Hero.”
• Medical Arts Medical Center (MAMC) of
Houghton, a four-physician family practice group,
is honored as a “Most Valuable Partner (MVP)
Hero.” MAMC has worked with the Western U.P.
Healthcare Access Coalition office to serve the
needs of uninsured area residents without a medical
home, resulting in a total of 157 visits by forty
patients for 2007 as well as volunteered ancillary
services.
• Patient Assistance Center of Dickinson
County Healthcare System of Iron Mountain has partnered
with the Dickinson Iron Medical Care Access Coalition
(DIMCAC) to coordinate prescription medication acquisition
for 1,524 residents of Dickinson and Iron counties
between January 2005 and December 2007. The center,
recognized as a “Most Valuable Partner (MVP)
Hero,” also assists seniors with Medicare-D
applications and shares staffing costs and a VISTA
volunteer with DIMCAC.
• Schoolcraft Memorial Hospital (SMH)
of Manistique is a partner organization with Schoolcraft
Health Access/Medical Care Access Coalition since
its inception in 2006. SMH hospital care and its
Rural Health Clinic services provided more than
$47,000 in free medical care visits, laboratory
tests and radiology studies for some 113 coalition
enrollees during 2007. SMH is recognized as a “Most
Valuable Partner (MVP) Hero.”
• Martha Short, MD, and her MCAC Clinic
staff, Melissa Broeders, PA-C, and Cathy Paquette,
LPN, of Marquette, long-time champions of compassionate,
volunteered care for uninsured patients in Short’s
internal medicine practice, are recognized as “Above
& Beyond Heroes.” The team has been a key
service provider at Medical Care Access Coalition’s
Volunteer Healthcare Clinic since it began in June
2003. In addition, Short has recruited colleagues
to help staff the volunteer medical clinic.
Seventeen community citizens and organizations were
nominated for 2008 Hero Awards.
Reservations for the awards dinner and ceremonies
may be made through April 25 by contacting Angel
Dittrich at 233-0210, adittrich@uphealthaccess.org
or by visiting www.uphealthaccess.org
Five local access coalitions serving all fifteen
U.P. counties share UPHAC’s mission of achieving
100-percent access to quality health care with dignity
for all residents of the U.P. They work with local
health care providers, pharmacies and prescription
services, doctors, hospitals and clinics and individual
volunteers to give uninsured residents of the region
opportunities to receive basic health care services,
prescriptions and medical testing free of charge
or at low cost.
Access Coalition services are available to U.P.
residents between the ages of nineteen and sixty-four
who are uninsured, do not qualify for state or federal
health care programs and whose household income
is below 200 percent of the federal poverty level.
For a single person, the annual income figure would
be $20,800 or less; for a family of four, the figure
would be $42,400 or less.
To highlight the continuing need of uninsured and
underinsured U.P. residents for access to health
care, local coalitions have planned other activities
during Cover the Uninsured Week:
• Awareness Walks in Manistique (April
27) and in Hancock, Iron Mountain and Marquette
(May 3); health events to follow walks in Marquette
and Iron Mountain.
• Presentations at community faith breakfasts,
highlighting Access Coalition programs available
for the uninsured in Delta (May 1) and Menominee
(April 28) counties.
• CTU Week “Dress Down Days”
at community business and government offices in
Sault Ste. Marie, Menominee and Escanaba .
• A CTU “Burger Bash” in Sault
Ste. Marie (April 28) and a CTU Pool Tournament
in Newberry (April 29).
For details about events or to apply for services,
contact the Local Access Coalition in your area:
• Community Health Access Coalition: serving
the eastern three counties, in Chippewa, 635-7483;
in Mackinac, 643-7253; in Luce, 293-8355.
• Dickinson-Iron Medical Care Access Coalition:
in Dickinson County, 774-3980; in Iron County, 265-4044
• Medical Access Coalition of Delta and
Menominee Counties: in Delta, 789-1627; in Menominee
County, 863-4051.
• Medical Care Access Coalition: in Marquette/Alger
counties, 226-4400; Schoolcraft Health Access in
Schoolcraft County, 341-1312.
• Western Upper Peninsula Healthcare Access
Coalition: serving the five western counties of
the region, in Hancock, 482-7122.
—Nancy Mathews,
UPHAC Program Coordinator
